NOW CLOSED: Tell Weetabix about breakfast in your house - you could win a £100 Sainsbury's voucher

[NewGirlHelenMumsnet]

Weetabix would like you to share your top tips for making breakfast time as stress free as possible. What are your top breakfast tips? Can you share your best breakfast stories with them on this thread? For example, do you run round trying to eat and feed the baby at the same time or is it a calm, relaxed affair in your house?

The best tips and stories will feature on their new page on Mumsnet (coming soon).

Everyone who shares a story or tip on this thread will be entered into a prize draw where one lucky winner will receive a £100 Sainsbury's voucher, from Weetabix.

Thanks MNHQ

Kids come downstairs, eldest daughter, age 8 puts cereal in bowl for her and DS, age 5. Pour milk themselves ( I clean up later!). two bowls of cereal maximum or they'd eat about 5 helpings each!!
Duahetr washes up breakfast things whilst son uts away items. All very civilised, took ages to get to this stage though!!!!

Crawl downstairs, dump baby and preschooler in front of TV, let dogs out and put kettle on. Porridge oats + milk in bowl, in microwave for preschooler. Put preschooler in front of porridge, change baby. Put baby in high chair. Make toast and vast pot of tea. Throw toast at baby, plonk bum on seat and commence tea-drinking in earnest.

Only once I have achieved an adequate level of caffeine in my bloodstream can I then go about dressing myself and the DC.

It's not chaotic. Or, maybe it is but I'm not sufficiently conscious to notice.

Baby goes straight in her highchair, with a few bits of dry cereal (cornflakes or similar) to nibble/play with, to keep her occupied so I can get everything else out in peace.

DS loves being a "helper" and being allowed to carry bowls etc to the table, though he isn't allowed to carry the most breakable ones yet.

It is VERY important that DS has his pirate bowl and a blue spoon and cup... and I secretly like my Emma Bridgewater mug best too, so can't really complain.

As soon as the baby is old enough to get some cereal from bowl to mouth, using fists or spoon, she gets left to feed herself - she likes that and it means I get to eat in relative peace! She does like to rub it into her hair though...

Weekends are the only time we get to have breakfast all together, so we often get something special like bagels or croissants for a treat.

We buy the small boxes ot cereal and allow my DS (4) to choose which one he would like. He tends to eat all the choc ones and all the ones he doen't like get left. We try to sit dowm and eat together with Cbeebies on in the background

No radio on! The less background noise, the less arguing and shouting there is. I try and get us all to sit around the table and talk about what we'll be doing that day. We put the cereal packets and milk in the centre, along with the juices and we all help ourselves. It's a nice start to the day, but only happens 1-2 times a week. The rest of the time it's breakfast club, or staggered breakfasts at the weekend.

Get the kids up as late as possible, get dressed as soon as they are up, upstairs, don't let the kids back upstairs or they will never come down once they start playing, no radio, no tv, put their bags/coats in the car whilst they are eating, then as soon as they are finished eating, teeth cleaned, shoes on, out the door. cup of tea and a slice of toast for me in the car.
The kids get up at 7 and we are out of the house by 7.35am.

17 month old is plonked in his highchair with a banana, whilst DH has a large bowl of cereal and cup of tea, and I prepare some porridge or toast for DS and myself, whilst also making the packed lunches.

I always have a large mug of milk, DS always has a beaker of water or diluted fruit juice (grape juice a particular fave at the moment). He WILL NOT eat cereal unless it is porridge, which is annoying, but we must try him on weetabix again sometime, it can't be much messier.

DH only drinks green tea with cranberry flavouring (any other type disgusts him for some reason).

We sometimes have the news on in the background, but mostly not.

Weekends, DH MUST have a croissant for breakfast, and DS can now demolish a whole one too, I stick with toast, or a scone when I remember to get one.

On working days we all have our breakfast in our own time. I get up earliest, then husband, then toddler. My DH and I have our porridge or cereal. DS has his formula feed for breakfast. As soon as we enter nursery, he asks for his toast and cereal.

On the four non-working days we have more time, so I have my breakfast later. As a result I often share it with junior. He is not normally hungry till about 9.30 to 10, so it is pointless pestering him to eat before. At about 10 we have to feed him no matter where we are (church, Musicbugs class, etc.). If we are out and about, he has sandwiches, otherwise bowls and bowls of cereal.

Saturdays and Sundays are the best. We have have a fry-up consisting of bacon and eggs with rolls. DS loves his eggs.

Now that blush pears are back (yeaaaaaah!) we can have them with weetabix or shredded wheat.

I dream of us all having a 'leisurely' breakfast round a big kitchen table (antique pine), the table piled high with cereal, toast, fruit juice, fruit salad, pots of fresh coffee etc. Everyone chatting happily about the forthcoming day, before we all go off our seperate ways on a beautiful sunny morning....What actually happens is DH is up first as he has an early start, he leaves as we all start to wake. So maybe a hasty 'bye' from DH, then I get the DC up. DS (17) shouts at me from under the duvet for waking him so early - he is 6th form now 'mother' so 'doesnt have to be in school til lunchtime' (still not sure if this is true). DD (4) demands breakfast, in a high pitched whine, usually she wants pizza, pasta or ice cream. As we dont have any of these she gets cereal which she eats while grumbling and giving me dirty looks. Meanwhile, I get ready for work and drink half a cold coffee while unloading/loading dishwasher/ washing machine. Oh, and we dont even have a table and even if we did it wouldnt fit in our poky kitchen :)

My daughter (9.11) gets herself up and dressed early every morning. At around 7am I get up and have a shower, then drag my son (11.6) out of bed.

Once downstairs, I do their breakfast (usually chocolate weetabix with hot milk, porridge or some other crappy cereal) and make myself a cup of tea while I do the lunchboxes. Then I throw some clothes at my son and beg threaten ask him to get dressed while I go upstairs and drink my tea in peace before I get dressed and put my make-up on. Then I yell at the kids to brush their teeth, do my daughter's hair and get in the car at around 8.35 for school run/work.

I have breakfast at work a cup of tea that my lovely assistant makes me, and a chocolate croissant which she's also brought me-- porridge.

Breakfast in my house is in 3-4 stages,I wake ds1 at 6.15am he has cereal and fruit juice in a calm ordered manner and leaves home at 7.30am I wake ds2 who eats his ceral and drinks tea amid much disorganisation he tries to eat whilst dressing looking for his glasses leaves the last little bit to get soggy whilst he nips upstairs then slurps the soggy bits from his dish whilst listening to gangster rap ds3 wakes at 8am and calmly retrieves his 'secret' breakfast he hides mini packs he sits and eats it very precisely whilst watching sky news (ds3 is 10)........Dh eats his breakfast at about 8pm he enjoys his cereal before working a night shift which means whilst we are content with cereal at 8am at 9am he might be tucking into braised steak or chicken tikke .

Get down early, run around like a crazy person getting all the bowls, special cups and spoons ready. Boil the kettle and wait for the onslaught, after their breakfast have a second cup of tea while I send them off to watch daddy shave (endlessly entertaining!) and regain some semblance of serenity.

if you make your porridge in the microwave in a jug, pyrex is easier to wash up than plastic.

that's my helpful tip.

another is: if you use instant porridge you will save a fortune buying own-brand rather than Ready Brek.

DH and DS (4) have boiled egg whilst I am in the shower.
DH also puts the coffee machine on and releases the dog into the garden for his morning toilet ablutions.
After school run I have Oats So Simple (must be Golden Syrup flavour though)

My aunt used to lay the table for breakfast the night before, even to putting cereal in the bowls. She had to stop when they found mouse poo in the cornflakes though.

My top tip is no TV or electronic entertainment before school. Everyone eats the same thing at the same time around the table, if the dcs have eaten their breakfast/packed their school bag/got dressed and cleaned their teeth - then they can play.

At the weekends we do pancakes.

Try to get most of the prep for school/work done the night before. Put the laptop on the table and let the kids watch an episode of Rastamouse (or similar) whilst they shovel their porridge, oops, Weetabix in. Large G&T.

My top tips (!) would be to do as much the night before as you can - so bookbags are done and by the front door, clean uniforms hanging up ready, socks, pants and vests on the radiator (For the DDs this is - DH can sort himself out ) and put some bread on in the bread machine overnight. Then get up early.

I get up and make a cup of tea for me and DH, feed the cats and put some coffee on, then have a shower and get dressed before the DDs get up.

They usually have bread or toast, juice or fruit, and some yoghurt. Hot chocolate on cold mornings. Sometimes I make drop scones, pancakes, omelettes or eggy bread. I like porridge, but I'm the only one, preferably with cream and brown sugar...

DH sometimes has muesli, we never have cereal. I did once give the DDs Krave when it was on special offer, bloody hell, it was like heroin for kids. They ate the whole box in about 2 days. (It's like nutella wrapped in golden nuggets of heaven. Apparently.)

I love breakfast, it's my favourite meal of the day, and my fantasy job is opening a reaturant serving nothing but yummy breakfast food all day, called 'Brekkaurant'.
Anyway, here's the reality: Dp always makes me tea in bed, then we get up and put Radio 2 on ( I actually like Chris Evans) and breakfast is actually a very relaxed affair, with dd usually having porridge and chopped up fruit, or scrambled eggs with ham on toast. Sometimes I go completely mad and have a fish finger sandwich (get me!) or simple old bacon and eggs. Then a cafetiere of delicious coffee, sometimes a pain au raisin.
For a treat dd has those little mini packets of cereal, chocolate crap and all, but I don't touch any cereal with a bargepole as I think it's all poison. But, when I was little I used to eat WEETABIX every day, with top of the milk and shedloads of sugar. And I was skinny .

Make sure you have enough milk.

In fact, move somewhere where there is a co-op/mini-supermarket round the corner, at 9.55pm do a check to see if you have cereal, bread and milk for the morning, realise you have nothing left but a slightly shrivelled pepper. Sprint out door without warning your DH. Confuse him intensely. Come back grasping milk and a pack of donuts. (Everyone likes donuts)

In morning get up, chuck bowls milk and cereal on table. DC demand sugar. Give them raisins. Stop Toddler from putting more raisins than cereal in bowl.

(Hide donuts)

Pack lunches. Send older kids off.

Eat donuts behind fridge door so toddler can't see.

Done!

Okay, I made up having older kids. It just looked mean when I typed 'husband' instead.

I clicked on this thread because my toddler lives on Weetabix! He has at least two for breakfast then two more later in the day if he's behaving. My baby has it mashed with banana or with an Organix fruit pot mixed in. Toddler normally has chopped fruit but has twice insisted on chopped avocado plus Weetabix and eaten it all up... a mini Heston Blumenthal, or a sign that his tastebuds are not what they should be?!

Meanwhile, I have grapefruit, black coffee and dried apricots, heaven.

My 7yr old gets dressed first while her 5 yr old brother has his breakfast then they swap places (though she puts an apron on the eat so it doesn't get down her uniform). Works well as there's no arguments in the bathroom or silliness on the landing.

Nowt wrong with a Krave every now and again.

No real tips, just get through it without screaming is my best one.

Though I could tell you about our 'slops' I suppose. It handily, for this thread, does include Weetabix. Mixed with Rice Krispies or Coco Pops. I think I'm keeping the production of Chocolate Weetabix going single handedly the amount my lot get through.

we get up at about 6 with whichever child has wondered into our bed into the night. the choice for kids is between weetabix, porridge or cheerios, with warm milk. at the weekends they are allowed chocolate weetabix as a treat (although there is much begging for little packets, which are a HOLIDAY TREAT).
i have grapefruit which middle child nicks, we unload dishwasher and all march upstairs to get changed. and to rouse eldest child (who at 6 now sleeps in till6.45am)
i like breakfast, the children however have a second breakfast at 8.30, which i swhatever they can con out of me!